Don't close your eyes
by JeanValjean2003
Summary: Sakura should really not close her eyes when evading Tsunade's punches. How will she overcome that problem? Set during the time when Naruto had left the village with Jiraiya. I do not own anything that belongs to Naruto nor do I make an profit with it. Please read and review but no slash.


Don't close your eyes

As every morning Sakura and Tsunade started their training on open grounds near the forest. The training had increased significantly in intensity and length over the past couple of weeks due to Naruto's leave with Jiraiya for the next two years - which meant no normal missions anymore for the remaining members of team 7 - and Sakura's will to catch up with the boys in terms of fighting skill. Of course Tsunade had never considered giving Sakura an easy time as her pupil. Years of fighting as a Sanin had taught her that the best thing she could do to help Sakura survive was to train her as hard as possible.

So here they were again. For Sakura this part of her education was the worst. Even though she was quite good in controlling her chakra for someone her age, and was eager to learn new healing techniques, evading attacks, especially Tsunade-shisho's, was nothing she was good at. Frankly, still after all these weeks of training she was still scared of the woman's brute strength and personally she felt she hadn't made any progress at all.

The later of course was not entirely true. Tsunade saw some progress in this particular part of her training, just not as much as she would have liked. That little girl got too easily scared. Sakura still closed her eyes during her attacks, accomplishing of course nothing besides being yelled at. And now Tsunade decided it was time to change that.

"Sakura?"

"Hai, Shisho?"

"I am satisfied with your progress in chakra control and with your speed in improving your medical skills. However, your lack of progress in fighting skills, and so far we have only practiced to dodge coming attacks, is not tolerable any longer. So from today we will only train that until I see some substantial progress. Until then there will be no other lessons. Do you understand?"

Sakura had paled at these words considerably and was very saddened by them: "Hai, Tsunade-shisho. I will give my best."

"I hope so. Otherwise it will be a long time before you will become a medic nin."

And then they started. As always, Tsunade three all kinds of stuff at the girl: logs, kunais, shuriken, water or gas filled balloons or herself. Sakura was really trying not to close her eyes but it still happened and every time she was hit hard. After an hour she was soaked in cold water, her nose and mouth were irritated due to the gas, she had trouble catching her breath and had too many bruises to count them all. She was exhaused. And Tsunade was - in lack for a better word - pissed.

"Sakura, why in hell are you still closing your eyes, when you know an attack is coming? What do you hope to gain by that? You endanger yourself more and your comrades. So why?"

"I don't know," came the timid answer. Sakura was almost in tears, not only because of her pain but because she had disappointed her teacher again. And that was even worse for her than being hurt and in pain.

"Shisho, I know, I am not supposed to close my eyes. And I am really trying," Sakura breathed out in huffs. "I train to improve my strength every day..."

"What good is your strength, if you cannot see your target, not even avoid its attacks?", Tsunade barked back. At this Sakura had no response. At that point Shizune got to them running.

"Tsunade-sama, you are need back in the village. There are new customers who claim to have several A- and S-missions, but only if the Hokage herself is talking to them." Tsunade sighed deeply at that: "Very well. I am going to my office then. Shizune, help Sakura clean up and then come to my office. Sakura, we will continue our training in the afternoon. Until then I expect you to work on your fighting skills. Understood?"

"Hai, Tsunade-shisho."

As soon as Tsunade was on her way, her assistant took a closer look at Sakura.

"Sakura, I need you to come with me to the hospital. There I can best take care of your injuries." The young woman however shook her head in denial. "No, I do not have time for that. Besides, you heard what Tsunade said, I am supposed to improve my fighting skills."

"And how exactly are you going to accomplish that with your broken rips, your burned lungs and your exhaustion on top of that?"

At that Sakura did not give an answer and instead started to summon some healing chakra within her hands. Shizune saw what the young girl was up and even though it was against her better judgment she imitated her and help her heal. After half an hour Sakura was able to breathe almost normally again and had no longer any broken bones.

"Thank you Shizune-san."

"I still think you should come with me to the hospital. You need rest."

"I am alright now, thanks to you," Sakura smiled. I will just eat something and then I will start practicing until Tsunade-shisho returns. Shaking her head Shizune got up and left Sakura. After all the had orders to return and help Tsunade. So she did.

"Ah Shizune, where have you been so long. I am drowning in paper work!"

"Tsunade-sama, it took a little while to heal Sakura's broken rips."

"Broken rips?", Tsunade was a little taken aback by that information. For once, she was sure she did not hit her that hard and second, Sakura knew she is supposed to report her injuries and that did not happen - neither today not during the past couple of days.

"Do you think the rips were broken today?"

"No, I do not think so. When I examined them, I saw that someone already had tried to heal them several times. I assume Sakura broke them a couple of days ago and had since then tried to heal them to the best of her knowledge."

That information made Tsunade really angry. "Where is she now?"

"She said, she wanted to eat something before resuming her training. So I am not really sure, Tsunade-sama."

Hitting the desk with her bolted fist Tsunade got up. "Shizune, I will be out for the rest of the day. No one is supposed to disturb me unless they wish to make contact with the next concrete wall I can find for them. Is that clear."

"Hai, Tsunade-sama," Shizune said, bowed to her superior and left the room.

_"Sakura. What were you thinking. Getting injured during training is one thing. It should be avoided but it can happen. However, not reporting it and thus risking to get worse? That is unacceptable. And you know it. Wait until I find you."_

And with these thoughts the fifth Hokage left her office in search for her pupil. She did not need long to find her. Sakura was sitting in one of the small food shops she usually ate lunch at.

"Sakura!", Tsunade yelled so loud, that several people dropped whatever they just had been holding in their hands. Sakure herself forgot to swallow her food properly and was now choking while looking with wide eyes up to her teacher. After several coughs she finally managed to breathe again normally.

"Tsunade-shisho. Am I late for our training? I am sorry, I thought I had time to eat something before we continue..."

"You are sorry?", Tsunade asked with a deadly tone in her voice. "Oh, I am sure you will be, but not for being late." And with that the older woman threw her hand out to touch Sakura's rips. As expected Sakura cringed at the sudden pain, because even though her bones were not longer broken they still felt frail.

"Tsunade-shisho, what are you doing?", Sakura asked now a little scared by the looks and actions of the older woman.

"I am just wondering how my own pupil forgot to mention that she had several broken rips and probably what other injuries she did not mention over the past weeks, even though she knows better than that."

"Shisho-sama, my injuries were not so bad. I just did not want to interrupt my training with you, so..."

"Not so bad? Shizune wanted to admit you to the hospital! And what would be a severe injury in your mind that should acquire a trained medic's attention? When you keel over from blood loss or when you are already dead? Am I then allowed to know that you are not healthy?"

At these words and due to the caused pain tears started to dwell in Sakura's eyes. She did not have any answers for that. She seriously did not think her injuries, which she got mostly when practicing on her own, were that bad. It still amazed her how her Tsunade did that - making the training as hard as possible while seeing to it, that Sakura never got seriously injured. But now was not a time to ask her that. Now was the time to find a way out of this mess.

Tsunade glared at her silent pupil, but some rational part of her brain told her that punching her to a pulp would not help her higher motive. It would just make her feel better for a short moment. Regaining her self control, she picked Sakura up and threw her over her shoulder and left the shop.

Taking by surprise, Sakure tried to get free. "Tsunade-shisho, what are you doing? Let me go! I can walk."

"Hold still," came the threatening response. "I am taking you home, where I will see what exactly the damage is. And then I will decided what to do with you. You are not walking right now, because I do not know, how, when you got injured."

Again Sakure did not know how to respond to that. She gave into her faith and stopped moving, until they passed her house. "Shisho, you just passed my house."

"I am well aware of that. I am taking you to my home. Unless you wish to be hospitalized and in that case I can ensure you will stay there for at least two weaks. Do you want that?"

"No, I don't."

The silent walk continued for another ten minutes when Tsunade finally reacher the Hokage tower where not only her office but also her living quarters were. The entered her living room and slowly lower the young girl to the couch before taking a seat herself in front of her.

"Now, tell me of your injuries. And I mean all of them. If I find so much as a splinter you did not mention before, I swear you are not going to like the consequences."

It took Sakura more than 20 minutes just to list all the injuries she had sustained over the past weeks and which were still not fully healed yet. As the list got longer and longer she could see how the fire in Tsunade's eyes increased to a point of absolute rage.

"I think these are all," Sakura finished with a small voice.

"You better be right about that. Now, I will first take care of your injuries. You will use that time to better come up with a very good explaining why you defied direct orders to reports any injuries again and again.

Being the best medical ninja in Konoha brought the advantage with it that Tsunade had her equipment for a basic examination not only at the hospital but at home as well. Hearing about all these wounds had made her angry, but seeing them now for herself - well, her temper was tested once again. At the same time she was surprised that Sakura had been able to go through with her morning training session the way she did. She must have been in quite some pain.

"Sakure, have you taken anything against the pain?"

"No, I did not. I healed the wounds as best as I could, but I did not take anything for the pain. It was endurable and these medications usually make me dopey."

"I see. Well, I am going to heal them now. All of them. But I think it will be better if you lie down for that."

Sakura knew that that was not a suggestion but an order she had to follow, so she did. After a while she felt her eyes becoming heavy and she had a hard time staying awake. Tsunade saw that but did not comment on it. She continued the treatment. When she was done after two hours, Sakura had fallen asleep.

_"Her exhaustion must have been bigger than I anticipated. Oh well, she is not going anywhere," _Tsunade mused and went to get a blanket for her pupil before tucking her in. Sakura did not wake at the movements around her, instead she looked truly relaxed and more importantly pain free.

Sakure woke the next morning, slightly confused about her whereabouts until she heard a voice behind her.

"Good morning Sakura. How are you feeling this morning?"

"Shisho! I, I feel fine. Why am I here?" Sakure was slightly confused.

"You fell asleep while I treated all your injuries and I decided you need the rest. And now we need to talk. And at the end of that you either agree with me or you will find yourself a new teacher after recuperating in the hospital for several weeks." Tsunade's face looked friendly, but the sound of her voice was anything but.

They were talking for several hours, in which Sakura expressed her desire to become stronger as fast as possible while Tsunade made her point very clear, that Sakura had to take better care of herself and that she must not, under any circumstances, willing risk her life and health. At the end, and as Tsunade had predicted, Sakura agree with her teacher and promised to take better care of herself, including to be honest about any wounds or injuries she got during her training.

Sakura was able to resume her normal training session with her shisho from the very next morning. And they continued to have these sessions for another four weeks, but still Sakura could not get rid of this bad habit of closing her eyes at the wrong moment. Though she got a little better a dodging flying objects.

At the beginning of week five, Sakura noticed that something was off with her shisho. When evening came she walked up to her in concern: "Tsunade-shisho, are you alright? You look pale and you are even sweating a little. You never do while training with me."

Tsunade managed a smile though she didn't feel like it. "I am alright, Sakura. I just haven't slept very well. Don't worry. I'll see you tomorrow."

In her eyes her teacher did not look any better the next morning. Now she did not only look pale, Tsunade was coughing, shivering and sweating.

"Tsunade-shisho, I don't think we should be training today. You look sick. You better head home and I inform Shizune to come by and take a look at you."

"You will do no such thing, Sakura. We need to teach you not to close your eyes when being in a dangerous situation. So let us start."

And with these words Tsunade threw out a punch into the direction of Sakura's face. However, be it due to her dulled senses or Sakura's improved ability to get out of harm's way, she missed. Instead Tsunade lost her balance and fell down.

"Shisho, are you alright. We should really get you home." Sakura was slightly desperate about now. She help the other woman up to stand on her feet only to be attacked again. However, again Sakura did not get hit but instead managed to push Tsunade a little bit into the right direction - her home. Being a quick study Sakura decided to lure her teach home by only making herself a promising target when staying on the path to the Hokage's home. It took a while but surely and steady they reached the village. Shizune, who had been picking up reports from various places saw them enter and immediately realized that something was wrong.

"Sakura, what is going on?"

"Shizune-san, I need your help," Sakura responded while evading another hit by Tsunade's fists." I believe Tsunade-shisho is ill, but she refuses to stop the training with me and to get home. So I have been kind of directing her there for the past while."

Hearing that Shizune decided to be a very pragmatic woman today. When Tsunde started another attack at her pupil she closed in her, forced some well placed chakra into her superior and thus caused said woman to faint. Then she called some nearby shinobi and order them to carry the Hokage home, while Sakura and she followed.

Minutes later, Shizune and Sakura had finished getting the Hokage into a nightgown and into bed. Shizune examined her quickly and deduced that Tsunade was suffering from a bad case of the flu and would need to stay in bed for at least five days.

"Sakura, I need to take care of the daily work in the Hokage's absence. Do you think you could take care of her? Ironically, even though Tsunade is always reprimanding everyone else, she is not very good at taking care of herself."

"I think I can do that, now that she is home."

"Alright. Just be careful. Tsunade-same is very testy when being sick and she throws some mean punches when waking up."

"I see. I will look out for that."

"Good. Then I am on my way. If you need anything, you know where to find me."

For the next hours Sakura was sitting at Tsunade's side,d apping her feverish forehead with a cold cloth to get the fever down. At some point Tsunade stirred first and then suddenly she raised her upper body, her eyes opened wide.

"Tsunade, you must not get up. You need to lie down," Sakura tried to push her shoulders back down on the bed. Instead she was suddenly faced with a fast moving fist right into her face. But instead of closing her eyes, Sakura caught the arm belong to said hand and stopped it. And then the same happened with the other hand, before Sakura was finally able to overpower the weakened Hokage and forced her back down on the bed. At that point Tsunade regained some clear thinking.

"Sakura, what are you doing in my bedroom?"

"Tsunade-shisho, you are sick with the flu. Shizune had you brought here and ordered me to look after you while you are sick. She also ordered bed rest for you for at least five days."

"Five days. Never." Tsunade was outraged at the prospect and immediately started to fight against it by getting up. Sakura, not being fazed in the slightest, patiently stopped her movements while evading any harmful attacks in her direction.

"Shisho, please. You have a fever and must not get up. See you are so weak, you are not even able to hit me with your punches -and that is not for the lack of trying."

The last remark caught Tsunade's attention. Indeed Sakura did not show any bruised or other signs of being hit and Tsunade knew from past experiences that she was very harmful for her surroundings when sick. So she was surprised that Sakura had managed to remain uninjured so far. She also felt very exhausted due to her little struggle with her student.

"So, now that I am awake, you can go home, don't you think?"

"No, shisho-sama. Shizune ordered me to stay with you until you are better. And you are not, yet. How about you catch up some more rest while I make you a nice soup?"

"Sakura, you do not need to stay with me here. I can take care of myself. Please go home."

"No, I won't. Right now, as long as you are sick Shizune is the one giving out orders. And until she tells me otherwise I will stay with you and take care of you. Besides, it is good practice for my later work as a medic nin. I assume I will encounter a stubborn ninja once in a while," Sakura responded with a big grin and vanished into the kitchen before Tsunade had a chance to punish her for her cheeky tone.

For Sakura the next days passed fairly quickly though they were a repetition in themselves. Every time Tsunade woke up, she practiced her dodging techniques - she had a feeling she got very good at that. Not closing her eyes when objects came flying into her direction was very helpful. Then, as soon as Tsunade was thinking straight again, they would have a discussion why or why not the Hokage was not allowed to get up yet until Shizune arrived for her daily check and ended the discussion swiftly. Otherwise Tsunade slept a lot while Sakura read some book or another she found in the Hokage's private library about medical herbs.

"Shizune, I am fine. I do not need you or anyone else to tell me that. I am getting up today and out of here."

"Hai, hai, Hokage-sama. Thanks to your pupil you are fever free again and not suffering from the flu anymore. And honestly I am glad that you are feeling better because there is so much paper work waiting for you."

"Paper work? I thought you took care of that? What have you been doing over the past five days?"

"Your job as far as I could. But there is a reason you are the Hokage and not me," Shizune responded with a grin and left the room.

Sighing, Tsunade got up and dressed. When she entered the kitchen, she found Sakura preparing a huge stake of pancakes.

"Sakura, are these all for yourself?"

"No, Tsunade-shisho. They are for you. I will be eating breakfast at home. I think my family misses me a little, having not seen me for the past days at all. Oh, and Shizune told me that my training will continue in three days time because she said, there is so much work for you to catch up. So, I will be off." And with a deep bow Sakura left the chambers as well.

This went all so quick that Tsunade did not really had the time to respond at all. She looked after her student before the focused on the pancakes and started to eat them.

Three days later pupil and teacher met again on the open training grounds. And very much to both their satisfaction Sakura was much better in evading than before. So much better that Tsunade allowed her to resume her normal medical studies. Sakura couldn't help but cry out in joy and hugging her shisho.

_"Well, having your shisho throw uncontrolled punches at you for a week, really helps. I just did not get the time to close my eyes."_


End file.
